'.'1?':'^ : 


RELATION    OF    THE    NORTH    TO    SLAVERY. 


DISCOURSE 


PREACHED  IN  THE 


FEDERAL  STREET  ^MEETINGHOUSE,  IN  BOSTON, 


ON  SUNDAY,  JUNE   11,  18M. 


EZRA    S.    GANNETT, 

MIM3TEB  OF  THE  FEDEKAL-STEEET   SOCIETr. 


rUBLISHED  BY  BEQUEST. 


BOSTON: 
CROSBY,    NICHOLS    &    COMPANY. 


MDCCCLIV. 


RELATIONS    OK    THE    NORTH    TO    SLAVERY. 


DISCOURSE 


PKEACHED  IN  THE 


FEDERAL  STREET  MEETINGHOUSE,  IN  BOSTON, 


ON  SUNDxiY,  JUNE   11,  1854. 


BY 

EZRA    S.    G  ANNE  T  T, 

WNISTEB  OP  THE  FEDERAL-STREET   SOCIETT- 


PUBLISHED  BY  BEQTTEST. 


BOSTON: 
CROSBY,    NICHOLS    &    COMPANY. 

MDCCCLIV. 


TDOKSTON,  TORRV,  AND  KMEBSOX,  rmSTKHS. 


DISCOURSE. 


MATTHEW,  VI.   23. 

IF  THE  LIGHT  THAT  IS   IN   THEK  BE  DABKNESS,  HOW  GREAT  IS  THAT  DARKNESS  I 

If  the  good  that  is  in  us  be  made  subservient  to 
purposes  of  evil,  how  low  must  we  have  sunk !  If 
the  understanding  be  misled  and  the  heart  depraved, 
how  deplorable  our  condition !  This  is  one  inter- 
pretation which  we  may  give  to  the  passage,  and  that 
which  our  Lord  probably  intended  it  should  bear.  It 
expresses  a  general  truth,  of  which  many  illustra- 
tions arise  as  we  look  into  ourselves  or  into  society. 
Take  these  two,  for  example: — If  we  allow  any  just 
opinion  or  right  feeling  to  lend  its  countenance  to  a 
wrong  course  of  conduct,  how  sad  is  that  perversion  of 
what  in  itself  and  in  its  proper  uses  is  good  !  Or,  if 
that  portion  of  a  community  who  entertain  enlight- 
ened views  and  command  the  widest  influence,  suffer 
their  judgment  or  their  influence  to  be  drawn  to  the 
support  of  measures  detrimental  to  the  character  or 
welfare  of  the  people,  how  sorely  should  such  a  mis- 
take be  lamented ! 


The  present  time  affords  us  an  opportunity  of 
making  either  and  all  of  these  applications  of  the 
truth  so  vividly  expressed  in  the  figurative  language 
of  the  text.  It  is  an  anxious  and  unquiet  time ; 
when  good  men  may  be  expected  to  differ,  and  when 
there  is  danger  that,  from  the  strong  influences 
which  will  be  brought  to  bear  on  different  minds, 
(aftecting  them  variously,  according  to  situation  and 
temperament,)  the  convictions,  sympathies  or  habits 
which  they  laudably  cherish,  by  inclining  them  to 
lean  too  much  on  the  one  side  or  the  other,  may 
betray  them  into  serious  error;  the  light  that  is  in 
them  in  effect  becoming  darkness. 

It  is  a  familiar  remark,  that  few  persons  act  on 
large  or  impartial  views ;  a  remark,  however,  that 
conveys  not  so  much  a  censure  on  any  one's  conduct, 
as  a  recognition  of  the  immaturity  of  our  present 
condition.  Only  a  well-trained  mind,  and  a  mind  of 
more  than  ordinary  strength,  can  rise  above  personal 
attachments  or  private  interests,  local  prejudices  or 
temporary  influences,  and  calmly  survey  the  whole 
field  of  duty.  Sometimes  we  say  of  others,  that  they 
carry  their  principles  too  far;  a  mischievous  criticism, 
if  it  suggest  the  thought  that  principle  may  ever  be 
sacrificed  to  other  considerations.  But  if  it  mean  that 
our  life  should,  in  all  its  purposes  and  details,  pro- 
ceed on  such  an  adjustment  of  the  several  principles 
that  have  force   in  tlie  moral  universe  as  shall  give 


to  each  its  proper  weight,  and  not  on  an  obedience  to 
any  one  of  them  alone,  it  is  both  true  and  practically- 
important.  Again,  it  is  often  said,  that  one  or  another 
has  acted  unwisely,  though  from  the  best  of  feelings. 
Here,  also,  is  a  truth  that  should  be  remembered. 
The  very  best  feelings  may  prompt  us  to  do  that 
which  a  sober  judgment  would  disapprove.  The 
clear  head  and  the  warm  heart  must  control,  or 
rather  help  one  pother. 

In   times  of  surprise  or   excitement,   of  peril    or 
distress,  we  stand  in  special  need  of  calm  and  resolute 
minds.     Calm  and  resolute ;  not  calm  only,  nor  res- 
olute only.    We  must  consider  what  should  be  done, 
and  be  ready  to  do  it.     Such  a  time  is  the  present. 
On  the  last  Sunday  I  alluded  to  a  subject  of  which 
I  feared  that  J  could  not  then  speak  with  a  clear  and 
temperate  earnestness.     What  I   may  now   say,  my 
friends,  I  ask  you  to  hear,  if  for  no  other  reason, 
because   when  such   issues   as   are   involved   in  this 
subject  are  brought  directly  before  us,  and  the  best 
and  the  worst  passions  are  aroused,  it  seems  neither 
frank  nor  manly  for  the  minister  to  affect  an  uncon- 
cern which  he  does  not  feel,  or  to  study  a  silence  that 
may  be  misconstrued.     I  have  no  fear  that  you  will 
take  offence   at  what   I  may  say,  even  if  it   should 
not  harmonize   with    your   conclusions;    because   I 
shall   endeavor  to   clothe   my  sincere  convictions  in 
language  suitable  to  this  place  and  hour. 


Ou  the  circumstances  which  have  raised  the  insti- 
tution of  Southern  Slavery  into  such  prominence 
among  our  thoughts  I  shall  not  dwell,  because  they 
seem  to  me  to  derive  their  importance  from  the 
subject  which  lies  behind  them,  and  not  to  give  that 
subject  an  importance  not  strictly  belonging  to  it.  It 
is  the  relation  which  we  shall  in  future  hold  to  Sla- 
very, that  was  brought  before  us  by  the  occurrences 
which  so  painfully  agitated  this  community  for 
many  days,  and  at  last  drew  tears  from  the  eyes  of 
men,  and  harsh  words  from  woman's  lips ;  it  is  the 
relation  in  which  we  shall  allow  ourselves  hereafter 
to  stand  towards  Slavery,  that  demands  serious  and 
Christian  thought.  For  this  is  not  purely  a  political 
question ;  it  has  its  moral  side,  and  religion  and 
Christianity  are  entitled  to  examine  it  as  entering 
within  their  domain. 

We  shall  arrive  at  a  just  decision  more  speedily, 
if  we  separate  the  question  both  from  the  individuals 
and  from  the  incidents  connected  with  any  particular 
exhibition  of  its  character.  A  mistake  has  been 
made,  as  I  believe,  in  regard  alike  to  the  indignation 
and  to  the  sympathy  that  have  been  awakened,  by 
confining  them  within  too  narrow  limits.  It  was 
inevitable  that  attention  should  be  given  to  the 
immediate  transactions,  and  to  the  persons  concerned 
in  them.  Those  transactions  were  the  exciting  cause 
of   public  feeling,  and  the  actors  of  one  class  and 


another  would,  of  course,  become  conspicuous.  The 
law,  too,  whether  in  its  menace  or  its  protection, 
must  deal  with  individuals  and  not  with  ideas.  But 
the  intelligence,  the  conscience,  and  the  heart  of  the 
people  should  expend  their  strength  not  on  the'  oc- 
casion or  the  exponent,  but  on  the  institution  which 
brings  them  into  notice,  and  on  our  connection  with  it. 
Another  mistake,  and  more  than  a  mistake,  a 
wrong  has  been  committed,  by  many  who  are  indig- 
nant at  wrong-doing  on  one  side  and  the  other,  in 
imputing  unworthy  motives  to  men  of  whose  conduct 
they  have  disapproved.  We  should  be  very  cautious 
how  we  allow  any  difference  of  opinion,  or  any  re- 
sentment we  may  feel,  to  tempt  us  to  ascribe  the 
course  another  may  pursue  to  moral  cowardice,  to  a 
love  of  popularity,  or  to  a  mercenary  spirit.  A  man 
may  take  a  wrong  view  of  his  duty,  and  yet  act  from 
an  imperative  sense  of  duty.  It  may  be  his  duty, 
under  the  circumstances  in  which  he  is  placed,  to  do 
that  which  under  other  circumstances  he  would  not 
only  be  free,  but  would  rejoice,  not  to  do.  I  should 
be  ashamed  to  repeat  such  truisms,  if  they  were  not 
disregarded,  as  well  by  those  who  uphold  order  as 
by  those  who  counsel  disturbance.  We  can  explain 
men's  opposite  behavior,  without  imputing  to  them 
bad  hearts;  and  it  is  at  once  arrogant  presumption 
and  gross  injustice  to  deny  that  others  may  have  been 
governed  by  a  sincere  purpose  of  rectitude,  because 


8 

they  have  clone  what  our  consciences  would  not  let 
us  do. 

The  judgment  of  many  at  the  Xoith  on  Slavery 
has  been  vitiated,  and  its  effect  upon  the  South  been 
impaired,   by  similar  errors.     To    make   the  fact  of 
slaveholding  conclusive  proof  against  a  man's  char- 
acter shows  a  disregard  of  one  of  the  plainest  lessons 
tauglit  by  human  history.     That  which  seems  to  you 
or  me  to  be  palpably  wrong,  may  be  accounted  by 
another  whose  education  has   been   different,  to  be 
justifiable  on  grounds  alike  of  morality  and  humanity. 
I  can  believe  that  a  Southerner  may  in  good  faith  use 
arguments  in  defence  of  Slavery  which,   as   I  hold, 
have  no  foundation  in  fact  or  sound  reason.     He  may 
assert  the  native  inferiority  and  inevitable  dependence 
of  the  black  race,  contradict  statements  and  conclu- 
sions which  appear  to  me  incontrovertible,  maintain 
that  the  transportation  of  the  negro  from  his  own 
continent  to  this  Christian  land  has  been  to  him  and 
his  descendants  a  blessing,  and  frame  a  vindication  of 
ownership  in  human  beings  from  texts  gathered  out 
of  the  Bible,  and  I  will  not  only  be  slow  to  charge 
him  with  wilful  sin,  I  dare  not  do  it.     The  slave- 
dealer  who  traffics  in  his  fellow-beings  for  the  sake  of 
gain,  or  who  treats  them  with  a  cruelty  which  he 
w^ould  not  exercise  towards  a  brute,  I  am  justified 
in  pronouncing  a  bad  man,  for  passion  or  avarice  is 
liis  acknowledged  motive.     But  there  are  thousands 


9 

of  masters  at  the  South  who  believe  Slaveiy  to  be  a 
logical  deduction  from  sure  premises,  and  a  fair  in- 
ference from  Christian  truths. 

It  is  equally  wrong  to  charge  upon  all  masters 
harsh  usage  or  cold  neglect  of  their  slaves.  In  many 
families  they  are  treated  with  uniform  kindness.  We 
gain  nothinsr  in  our  address  to  the  consciences  or  the 
sensibilities  of  Southern  slaveholders  by  representing 
them  as  destitute  of  all  proper  feeling. 

Not  less  impolitic  is  it,  nor  less  imsound,  to  take 
our  impression  of  Slavery  from  the  extreme  cases 
which  arise,  on  the  one  hand  or  on  the  other.  Such 
cases  show  to  what  abuse  of  authority  it  may  tend,  or, 
contrariwise,  what  mitigation  it  may  carry  in  its  own 
bosom ;  but  they  do  not  expose  the  real  character  of 
the  institution :  and  it  is  against  this  that  we  must 
direct  our  efforts,  and  this  therefore  that  w^e  need  to 
understand.  The  fault  in  that  tale  which  had  such 
an  unprecedented  reception  from  half  the  civilized 
world,  but  in  its  permanent  influence  will  be  seriously 
damaged  by  this  defect,  lies  in  the  fact,  that  it  is  a 
narrative  of  exceptional  cases ;  each  of  which  may 
have  had  its  counterpart  in  actual  life,  but  still  illus- 
trates a  comparatively  rare  result  of  the  system.  The 
beautiful  piety  of  the  slave  and  the  sweet  humanity 
of  the  child,  the  brutahty  of  the  trader  and  the  bar- 
barity of  the  planter,  in  that  tale,  arc  all  of  this  class, 
exceptions,  not  the  usual  characteristics  of  the  sys- 

2 


10 

tern ;  and  therefore,  however  artistically  grouped,  they 
cannot  present  a  picture  faithful  to  the  reality  which 
they  are  meant  to  describe.  Neither  a  gallery  of 
lovely  faces  nor  a  museum  of  deformed  limbs,  nor 
both  of  them  together,  would  exhibit  mankind  as 
they  appear  in  life.  Besides,  when  we  give  our  atten- 
tion to  the  grosser  examples  of  inhumanity  and  im- 
morality whicli  occur,  we  may  overlook  or  slightly 
consider  the  inherent  quality  of  the  institution  itself, 
while  this  it  is  which  should  excite  our  strongest 
aversion. 

To  this  then  we  come  at  last,  and  till  we  come  to 
this  we  fall  short  of  a  just  consideration  of  the  mat- 
ter, —  the  intrinsic  character,  the  inherent  vice  of 
slavery.  ^Vliat  should  we  of  the  North  think  of  it 
as  an  institution,  and  what  should  we  do  in  regard 
to  it,  that  the  light  whicli  is  in  us  may  not  be  dark- 
ness? 

To  the  former  of  these  questions  I  answer,  we 
should  think  of  it  as  ineradicably  wrong  and  bad- 
The  institution  which  dooms  a  human  being  to  in- 
voluntaiy  servitude  as  long  as  his  master  chooses  to 
keep  him  in  that  state,  and  makes  him  a  piece  of 
property,  to  be  transferred  from  one  owner  to  another, 
like  any  other  article  of  merchandise,  should  be  re- 
garded by  us  Avith  abhorrence.  The  fact  of  irre- 
sponsible ownership  constitutes  the  central  offence 
in    the   case.     Until  we  deny  the   right  of  man  to 


11 

buy  and  sell  his  fellow-man,  as  if  he  were  a  beast 
of  burden  or  a  part  of  the    household  stuff,  we  do 
not  put  ourselves  on  the  only  position  from  which  we 
cannot  be  dislodged.     So  long  as  we  build  our  com- 
plaints or  reproaches  upon  the  e\ils  which  the  system 
generates,  rather   than    on    the   evil  of   the   system 
itself,  we  give  the  slaveholder  a  double  advantage; 
as  he  can  reply  that  these  results,  however  common, 
are   incidental,   not   unavoidable;    and   further,  that 
institutions  which  we  foster  are  debased  by  similar 
results.     Pointing   to  our  homes,  he  may  cite  from 
the  records  of  our  courts  instances  of  parental  cru- 
elty or  conjugal  unhappiness,  and  maintain  that  the 
principle  of  judgment  which  we  apply  to  his  social 
state  condemns  our  domestic  life.     Southern  Slavery, 
in  its  mildest  form,  involves  a  great  wrong ;  a  wrong 
to  every  one  of  those  held  in  bondage,  a  wrong  to  the 
race  of  which  they  are  a  part,  a  wrong  to  human 
nature.     This  truth,  I  am  willing  to  confess,  I  never 
felt  in  its  full  power  till  I  came  into  close  observa- 
tion of  the  system.     A  year  ago  I  had,  for  the  first 
time,  an  opportunity  of  ascertaining  its  real  import. 
I  saw  this  peculiarity  of  Southern   life   under   the 
most  favorable  circumstances,  for  a  lenient  or  approv- 
ing judgment.      I  beheld   its  very  best   aspects.      I 
saw  the  well-dressed  and  lightly  tasked  slaves  of  the 
city,  and  the   kindly  treated  and   tenderly  watched 
slaves  of  the  plantation.     And  I  returned  home  with 


12 

a  persuasion  which  I  think  will  never  be  changed, 
that  Slavery  is  a  grievous  wrong.  I  heard  its  pro- 
priety and  its  necessity  maintained,  and  I  came  home 
with  the  conviction  that  it  is  utterly  indefensible  and 
unjustifiable. 

It  does  not  follow  that  immediate  emancipation, 
in  the  sense  of  absolute  freedom  for  the  millions  now 
held  in  bondage,  is  the  duty  of  the  South,  or  would 
be  its  duty,  if  the  whole  South  entertained  the  con- 
^  iction  which  I  have  expressed ;  since  their  past  life 
has  disqualified  the  greater  portion  of  the  slaves  for 
taking  care  of  themselves.  But  an  immediate  adop- 
tion of  measures  for  the  final  liberation  of  every 
man,  woman  and  child,  now  regarded  as  transferable 
property,  is  what  a  correct  view  of  duty  would 
obtain  from  the  Southern  masters.  And  we  of  the 
North  have  the  same  right  to  speak  of  their  duty, 
(in  terms  of  brotherly  kindness,  not  of  angry  invec- 
tive,) that  we  have  to  speak  of  Euglish  legislation 
about  India,  or  the  Czar  s  government  of  his  empire. 
Free  criticism  is  a  privilege  which  the  people  of 
this  century  claim  in  virtue  of  their  place  in  the 
history  of  civilization.  At  least,  whether  the  North 
address  the  South  in  lanfjuage  of  fraternal  counsel 
or  not,  public  sentiment  here  should  be  sound  on 
the  subject.  Slavery  should  be  held  in  universal 
and  immitigable  condemnation. 

It  may  be  more  difficult  to  determine  what  should 


13 

be  done  than  what  should  be  thought,  since  action 
may  induce  unpleasant  relations  or  commit  us  to 
illegal  proceedings,  while  thought  is  be}ond  the 
reach  of  any  but  a  Divine  penalty.  Some  may  think 
we  can  do  nothing,  hampered  as  we  are  by  restrictions 
of  both  a  political  and  moral  nature.  But  these 
restrictions  do  not  impose  the  duty  of  acquiescence 
in  whatever  may  arise  to  prove  our  fidelity  either  to 
constitutional  obligations  or  to  moral  convictions. 
We  may  more  easily  distinguish  what  is  within  the 
scope  of  our  practical  purposes,  if  we  first  decide 
what  we  may  not  do.  And  here  it  will  be  sufiicient 
for  us  to  notice  two  directions  which  our  activity 
must  avoid. 

We  are,  in  the  first  place,  precluded,  by  the  terms 
of  citizenship  under  which  we  enjoy  the  privileges 
of  the  Union,  from  intermeddling  with  Slavery  in  the 
States  which  adopt  it  as  a  part  of  their  social  insti- 
tutions. So  long  as  we  remain  under  the  Constitution 
of  the  United  States,  each  State  must  be  left  un- 
disturbed in  the  settlement  of  its  own  internal  policy. 
No  other  State  may  attempt  to  control  that  policy, 
while  it  is  kept  within  the  boundaries  of  the  State 
in  which  it  originates,  and  does  not  invade  the  con- 
stitutional rights  of  any  citizen  of  another  State. 
The  General  Government  is  placed  under  similar  re- 
straint by  the  terms  on  which  it  exists.  No  Northern 
man  may  assail  the  institutions  of  the  South  by  any 


14 

direct  or  covert  action  on  the  soil  to  wliich  they 
belong,  or.  by  any  measures  at  home  inconsistent 
Avith  a  strict  interpretation  of  the  compact  under 
Avhich  the  Republic  Mas  organized.  Plaui  speech 
and  fair  discussion  are  allowable,  if  one  can  find 
hearers,  but  the  instrument  which  makes  us  a  nation 
guarantees  to  the  South  an  unmolested  enjoyment  of 
its  own  ways,  so  far  as  they  affect  only  itself;  and 
we  can  honorably  -violate  neither  the  letter  nor  the 
spirit  of  that  instrument,  while  we  avail  ourselves 
of  the  advantages  it  yields  us,  or  recognize  its  au- 
thority as  the  supreme  law  of  the  land. 

The  law  of  the  land.  We  are  subjects  of  a  govern- 
ment which  we,  or  our  flithers  on  our  behalf,  have 
created,  as  well  as  freemen  who  have  inherited  liber- 
ties that  we  will  never  alienate.  Order  is  the  first 
condition  of  a  safe  or  prosperous  community.  We 
are  prohibited,  therefore,  from  resorting  to  violence 
as  an  expression  of  our  dislike  of  Slavery.  This  is 
the  second  restraint  which  we  must  religiously  ob- 
serve. Religiously,  I  say,  because  religion  teaches  us 
"  if  it  be  possible,  as  far  as  in  us  lies,  to  live  peace- 
ably with  all  men,"  and  to  set  before  one  another  an 
example  of  respect  for  law.  Until  that  solemn  crisis 
arrives,  which  in  the  providence  of  God  is  the  ulti- 
mate fact  of  political  history,  when  a  people  are 
driven  upon  the  right  of  revolution,  and  society  re- 
turning to   its  first  principles  is  dissolved   into    its 


15 

Original  elements,  —  a  crisis  which  no  thoughtful 
man  will  contemplate  hut  with  dismay,  —  we  must 
avoid  all  conflict  with  the  laws  o¥  the  legal  author- 
ities of  the  land.  We  may  present  a  passive  resist- 
ance to  an  enactment  or  a  mandate  which  it  would 
violate  our  consciences  to  obey.  Else  our  obedience 
to  human  law  may  supplant  our  respect  for  what  we 
believe  to  be  the  requisition  of  God,  which  would 
be  fatal  to  integrity  and  purity  of  character.  But  in 
this  collision  between  the  claims  of  an  earthly  and  a 
Divine  government,  each  of  which  we  recognize  as 
legitimate,  we  must  accept  the  penalty  of  disobedi- 
ence to  the  former,  —  suffering,  not  fighting  for  con- 
science' sake.  Violence  in  the  support  of  truths  dear 
to  us,  or  disorderly  resistance  to  offensive  legislation, 
is  as  unwise  as  it  is  improper,  and  as  unchristian  as 
it  is  injurious.  Painful  as  may  be  the  struggle,  we 
must  not  disturb  the  public  peace  for  the  sake  of 
redressing  a  private  wrong.  If  the  barriers  of  order 
may  be  swept  away  by  popular  commotion,  freedom 
is  imperilled,  and  right  is  left  to  the  arbitration  of 
numerical  force. 

What  then  remains  for  us  to  do  1  More  than  some 
persons  may  at  first  suppose.  Four  ways  are  open 
by  which  we  may  signify  our  repugnance  to  Slavery, 
without  the  breach  of  any  obligation  that  rests  on 
us  as  Christians  or  citizens. 

First,   we  may  maintain  an   inflexible  determina- 


16 

tion  to  be  drawn  into  no  farther  support  or  counte- 
nance of  this  institution,  direct  or  indirect,  than  we 
are  ah-eady  obliged  to  render.  Not  a  hair's  breadth 
beyond  the  necessities  of  the  case  should  we  allow 
ourselves  to  go,  under  whatever  inducement.  Nei- 
ther by  intimidation  nor  by  flattery  should  we  be 
diverted  from  the  strictest  construction  of  our  con- 
stitutional and  legal  interest  in  this  subject.  While  we 
adhere  to  the  terms  which  our  fathers  made  a  part 
of  the  framework  of  government  for  their  posterity, 
we  must  enter  into  no  new  compromises,  arrange- 
ments or  concessions,  by  which  the  peculiar  mstitutions 
of  the  South  shall  be  made  more  impregnable  than 
they  now  are.  Our  sister  States  can  claim  of  us 
nothing  more  than  a  fulfilment  of  the  compact  which 
we  found  pressing  upon  the  land  when  we  became 
capable  of  discharging  political  duties ;  and  if  they 
openly  or  artfully  attempt  to  lead  us  into  any  further 
concurrence  with  them  in  upholding  their  favorite 
interest,  we  must  be  as  firm  as  justice  itself,  refusing 
to  harbor  a  suggestion  to  that  efi'ect.  New  England 
is  involved  enough  already  in  the  sad  perplexity  of 
sustaining  what  she  disapproves,  and  nothing  more 
may  she  yield. 

Secondly,  we  may  take  all  constitutional  and  law- 
ful methods  for  securing  an  abrogation  of  those 
enactments,  and  of  those  proAisions  of  the  fundamental 
law,  which  offend  our  moral  convictions.     By  peti- 


17 

tions  to  Congress,  and  especially  by  placing  in  our  na- 
tional legislature,  and  so  far  as  we  may  be  able,  in  still 
higher  posts,  men  \ylio  will  represent  our  views  and 
feelings,  we  may  seek,  and  eventually  secure  a  repeal 
or  modification  of  obnoxious  statutes.  I  confess  that 
I  do  not  attach  to  such  a  measui'e  the  importance  it 
holds  in  the  judgment  of  many  others,  because,  as  I 
have  said,  I  think  our  moral  sentiment  should  go 
behind  any  particular  form  which  the  e^dl  may 
assume,  to  the  radical  vice  of  the  system;  and  I 
should  be  grieved  to  see  the  North  sinking  into 
apathy  in  regard  to  the  condition  of  the  Southern 
slaves,  because  the  most  objectionable  features  of  a 
specific  law  were  changed.  Still,  whatever  we  can  do 
to  lessen  the  enormity  of  the  evil,  or  to  mitigate  its 
severity,  should  be  done. 

Thirdly,  we  may  oppose  every  attempt  of  the 
South  to  extend  the  institution  beyond  its  present 
limits.  Such  opposition  we  are  bound  to  make  by 
every  principle  of  loyalty  to  our  country,  or  to  the 
cause  of  human  freedom.  Slavery  is  intrinsically 
bad,  and  therefore  we  have  no  right  to  consent  that 
resions  in  which  it  does  not  now  exist,  and  over 
whose  future  history  we  have  any  control,  should 
be  afilicted  by  its  presence.  Politicians  or  moralists 
at  the  South  may  take  a  different  view  of  its  charac- 
ter ;  and  they  have  a  perfect  right  to  press  that  view 
on  our  consideration.  But  while  we  persist  in  pro- 
3 


18 


nouncing  it  wholly  false,  we  are  not  justified  in  per- 
mitting involuntary  bondage  without  crime  to  tres- 
pass on  a  single  inch  of  territory  beyond  that  which 
it  now  impoverishes.  It  is  our  duty,  to  resist  and 
defeat  the  purpose  of  the  slaveholder  to  subject  a 
soil  not  yet  marked  by  this  stain,  to  the  disgrace 
and  damage  it  would  incur  by  legalizing  property 
in  human  beings.  Let  Southern  statesmen  argue  in 
defence  of  what  they  consider  the  rights  of  the 
South ;  but  let  our  statesmen  stand  firm  on  what 
w^e  believe  to  be  both  the  right  and  the  duty  of  the 
Xorth.  If  the  consequence  should  be  that  our  poli- 
tics become  sectional,  and  the  country  be  divided 
according  to  local  judgments,  we  shall  not  be  ac- 
countable for  this  result.  It  will  have  been  forced 
upon  us,  and  they  who  shall  compel  us  to  accept 
such  an  issue  must  answer  to  posterity  for  placing 
us  in  a  position  from  which  we  cannot  honorably 
retire. 

Fourthly,  we  may  proceed  to  rescue  our  own  soil 
from  being  trampled  by  those  whose  attempts  to 
reclaim  their  fugitive  servants  are  conducted  in  a 
manner  to  wound  our  sensibilities  and  provoke  our 
passions.  I  repeat,  that  while  a  law  stands  in  force, 
we  must  either  consent  to  its  execution  or  bear  the 
penalty  of  disobedience.  But  when  the  execution  of 
that  law  not  only  inflicts  a  pang  on  our  moral  nature, 
but  is  made  doubly  painful  by  the  frequency  and  zeal 


19 

with  which  it  is  carried  into  effect,  we  cannot,  or  if 
we  can,  we  ought  not  to  fold  our  arms  and  close  our 
lips  in  patient  acquiescence.  The  principle  of  the 
present  Fugitive  Slave  Law  was  embodied  in  the  sim- 
ilar act  of  Congress  passed  more  than  half  a  century 
ago,  but  for  more  than  fifty  years  the  South  was 
content  that  the  act  should  remain  comparatively 
inoperative ;  let  it  take  the  same  course  now,  and  the 
North  would  acquiesce  in  the  legal  validity  of  a 
claim  seldom  enforced.  But  if  the  South  evince  a 
determination  to  put  Northern  feeling  to  a  trial  on 
this  question  whenever  it  shall  have  an  opportu- 
nity, Northern  men  will  not  consent  to  witness  often 
such  scenes  as  we  were  made  to  endure  a  few  days 
since.  The  question  will  not  be  simply,  whether  a 
law  shall  be  executed  or  be  resisted ;  a  deeper  question 
will  arise,  when  the  Southern  master  shall  use  the 
free  States  as  the  ground  on  which  to  assert  the  im- 
maculate character  of  Slavery.  The  alternative  will 
then  present  itself,  whether  we  will  become  ready 
participants  in  upholding  a  system  which  we  abhor, 
or  will  seek  a  dissolution  of  the  bond  which  holds  us 
and  the  South  together.  This  is  sad  language,  and 
fearful.  I  know  what  it  means,  and  what  it  suggests. 
But  the  facts  which  wring  such  language  from  us  are 
sad  and  fearful.  I  have  loved  the  Union  as  dearly 
perhaps  as  any  one.  I  have  clung  to  it  as  the  guide 
and  hope  of  the  oppressed  nations  of  the  world.     I 


20 

have   lost   friends   and   been  traduced,  —  that  is  no 
matter,  except  as  it  shows  how  I  have  spoken, —  be- 
cause I  maintained  that  the  Union  must  be  preserved 
at  almost  any  cost.    I  say  so  now.    But  it  may  cost  us 
too  much.     If  every  manly,  and  honest  and  Christian 
sentiment  must  be  subjected  to   continual  indignity, 
then  will  sober  men,  who  have  loved  the  Union  and 
clung  to  it,  ask  whether  a  peaceable  separation,  with 
all  its  prospective   issues,  would   not   be   preferable. 
We  do  not  want  what  has  been  justly  styled  "  the 
characteristic  of  Southern  civilization  "  made  familiar 
to  our  eyes,  and  we  shall  not  be  able,  I  think,  to  bear 
•  it.     Not  as  threatening  or  braving  the  South,  do  we 
so   speak.     We   believe   the   Southern   part   of    our 
country  would  suffer  more  than  we  from   disunion. 
But  the  relative  prosperity  of  the  two  sections  can- 
not be  permitted  to  decide  a  question  of  such  moral 
import   as  this.      In    sorrowful,    not    in    passionate 
emphasis  we  say,  that  if  the  South  insist  on  mak- 
in"-  the  North  the  scene  of  its  activity  in  maintain- 
in"-  an  institution   from   which  the   conscience   and 
the  heart  of  the  North  revolt,  it  will  compel  us  to  ask 
in  serious  and  solemn  deliberation,  is  the  Union  worth 
preserving  on  that  condition  1 

Many  of  our  best  feelings  will  shrink  from  a  con- 
templation of  this  alternative,  and  will  incline  us  to 
turn  away  from  a  subject  of  such  painful  and  diffi- 
cult decision.     But  what  is  this,  if  it  be  not  letting 


21 

the  light  that  is  in  us  become  darkness  1  May  I,  in 
a  few  words  bestowed  on  each,  indicate  four  among 
the  influences  that  are  likely  to  have  this  effect  1 

First,  some  persons  will  recur  to  the  love  of  peace, 
which   is   with  them   a  conscientious   as   well   as  a 
Christian  feeling.     But  I  advise  no  measures  of  vio- 
lence.   In  the  worst  resort,  a  peaceable  division  of  our 
territory  is  all  that  I  would  dare  to  counsel ;  and  if 
Southern  statesmen  be  sincere  in  the  language  they 
have  used,  many  of  them  would  welcome  the  proposal. 
If  they  would  not,  then  the  instruction  they  would 
receive  in  regard  to  the  strength  of  Northern  feeling 
might  produce  a  change  in  their  policy.     What  we 
say  is,  that  our  national  administration  and  our  free 
soil   must  not  be   used  to  promote   the  interests  of 
Slavery;   and  if,  in  maintaining  this   position,  a  re- 
sult which  five  years  ago,  or  a  year  ago,  we  should 
have  regarded  as  among  the  most  extravagant  sug- 
gestions of  a   gloomy   foresight   should   become  in- 
evitable, and  even  be  followed  by  disasters  which  we 
tremble  when  we  think  possible,  we  may  deplore  the 
situation  into  which  we  shall  be  brought;  but  how 
can  we,  with  self-respect  or  in  consistency  with  our 
holiest  persuasions,  avoid  it  I    We  must  do  our  duty, 
and  leave  the  issue  with  Him  who  ruleth  over  the 
affairs  of  men. 

Others  will  be  led  by  their  attachment  to  the  Union, 
to  deprecate  a  disruption  of  the  ties  which  bind  these 


22 

States  into  one  great  Republic.  I  have  already  said  it 
would  be  dreadful ;  and  I  do  not  think  it  need  come, 
for  I  believe  that  nothing  but  firmness  and  harmony 
at  the  North  is  needed,  to  deter  the  South  from 
driving  us  upon  ulterior  measures.  But  if  it  must 
come,  then  I  can  only  repeat,  that  precious  as  our 
national  history  and  national  hope  are,  righteousness 
and  liberty  are  still  dearer  possessions. 

Many  of  us  would  grieve  at  the  interruption  of 
domestic  sympathies.  Thank  God,  these  sympathies 
are  felt  at  the  South  as  well  as  here,  and  they 
may  arrest  the  evil  which  we  dread,  by  mitigating 
the  evil  which  we  deplore.  But  the  kindly  rela- 
tions of  households  need  not  be  broken  because 
our  political  union  is  dissolved.  Such  relations  dis- 
regard the  lines  of  national  sovereignty,  and  weave 
the  fimilies  of  the  earth  together  by  closer  bonds 
than  those  which  spring  from  the  support  of  a  com- 
mon government. 

Yet  other  persons  may  be  influenced  by  the  effect 
upon  the  financial  and  mercantile  interests  of  the 
land,  which  depend  so  much  on  mutual  confidence 
and  the  most  ready  interchange  of  commodities. 
Doubtless,  all  parts  of  the  country  would  suffer  from 
a  disturbance  of  our  political  connections ;  but  there 
is  enterprise  and  energy  and  wisdom  enough  in  the 
Northern  States  for  them  to  retrieve  their  aft'airs, 
though  for  a  time  prostrated.     And  if  duty  call  us 


23 

to  proceed,  in  whatever  direction,  I  will  not  sup- 
pose that  a  love  of  gain  would  make  us  deaf  to  the 
command. 

I  gladly  quit  this  strain  of  remark.  I  have 
been  speaking  of  a  possible  alternative  for  which 
we  may  need  to  be  prepared.  The  surest  way  to 
prevent  its  actually  coming  before  us  is,  for  all  to 
take  a  calm  and  firm  attitude  on  the  subject  which 
has  siven  rise  to  this  discourse.  We  must  not 
ignore  the  fact  of  Slavery;  —  we  cannot  ignore  it. 
Then  must  we  not  be  indifferent  to  it.  We  must 
indulge  and  express  Christian  feeling  on  the  subject. 
We  must  not  let  the  light  that  is  in  us  be  darkness  ; 
but,  following  our  convictions,  must  act  wisely,  seek- 
ing of  God  more  light  and  more  strength. 

I  have  spoken  to  you,  my  friends,  feebly,  but  hon- 
estly. I  have  meant  to  speak  frankly,  but  neither 
dogmatically  nor  vehemently.  I  have  been  impelled 
by  a  feeling  that  I  could  not  put  aside,  to  express  my 
own  opinions.  Allow  them  the  weight  which  they 
may  seem  to  you  to  deserve. 


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